Why Reef Safe Sunscreen Is Important in the Age of Global Warming

If you were to be thrown into a room with doctors doing a ton of research related to skin cancer prevention and treatment right now, you would learn two things: First, that there are lots of amazing new ways scientists are battling skin cancer. You’ve heard of chemotherapy, but there’s also a thing called immunotherapy, where doctors use various techniques to trick your own immune system into battling the tumor itself, and photodynamic therapy, in which red light is used to get rid of precancels and basal and squamous cell carcinomas. Secondly, you’d learn that it’s a lot better never to get skin cancer at all, because neither of these therapies are painless (immunotherapy can involve injections of viruses into the tumor to make it look more obviously foreign to your bad guy-fighting T-Cells, you’ll get intense post-treatment swelling and redness with photodynamic therapy).

So, what does avoiding skin cancer mean in 2018? Just…wear your sunscreen? In a word, no. Think of sunscreen like eye shadow. It’s an important part of your makeup routine, but you probably wouldn’t use it alone — you’d also wear mascara, maybe a little concealer, maybe a little highlighter and a lip color. According to Michael A. Marchetti, a dermatologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering’s Cancer Center, you should be wearing three other things: A wide-brimmed hat, UPF protective clothing (brands like Athleta and Lululemon stock stuff that doesn’t look dorky, we promise), and sunglasses anytime you’re out in the sun. While these measures sound like extra work at first, they’re actually quite the opposite — you don’t need to think about how much to put on and you’ll never need to reapply.

As for the sunscreen itself, this is where global warming comes in. While coral can get bleached by certain actives in sunscreen (a story that we initially reported almost exactly a year ago), the areas with the greatest amount of coral reef bleaching are actually in places tourists don’t frequent as much — the larger culprit is global warming, Marchetti says. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t do your part by wearing sunscreens that won’t harm aquatic resources. Luckily, nearly every brand has options with the two reef-safe active ingredients — zinc oxide and titanium dioxide — available. Scan for both on the label when you’re picking up your next SPF. You can find them in Neutrogena Sheer Zinc Dry-Touch Sunscreen SPF 50 or Unsun Cosmetics Mineral Tinted Board Spectrum Face Sunscreen SPF 30, which, amazingly, doesn’t show up on even the darkest skin tones (we tested it!). Oh, and don’t forget your sunglasses.

Discover even more of our (and top dermatologists') favorite sunscreens, below: